Locked-out workers can return to job Monday

Union steelworkers will be back on the job at a Kansas City manufacturing plant next week after approving a new contract.

Nearly 200 members of United Steelworkers Local 1307 had been locked out since their previous contract with Milbank Manufacturing Co. expired at 12:01 a.m. Monday.

The two sides reached a tentative agreement Wednesday, and the company says union members ratified the new contract in a vote early Friday. A federal mediator had been brought in to help resolve the standoff.

Terms of the new contract were not disclosed. Both sides had said increases in employee contributions to health insurance costs were the main sticking point.